I really hate walking up stairs. Not because I'm lazy, but it makes me very self-conscious. I feel like a total moron, especially when I think someone's watching. I become so paranoid that I often cause myself to trip up the stairs.

Climbing a flight of stairs is something we all do so often that I shouldn't even think about it, but I always do. Whenever I'm walking with someone, even in mid-conversation, and we come to a flight of stairs, I immediately feel like a complete moron. I know how stupid I look once we start going up.

I've never actually seen myself go up a flight of stairs, so I don't know if my "fears" are a reality. Maybe I don't look strange at all - at least no more than anyone else.

Going up hills is even worse. I'm one hundred percent positive that it is not possible to walk normally up a hill. I've never seen anyone do it, and with my little stair problem, there's no way I could pull it off. This never occurred to me until I noticed the way my friend's dad walked up a hill on a golf course. He was marching upwards in a bouncy, giddy sort of way. You'd swear he was wearing anti-gravity boots the way he bounced around. Now everyone seems to do it that way. Hills are no longer being climbed by regular people; it's being done by a bunch of astronauts!

Since everyone does it, it only makes sense that I look equally as ridiculous. Though I've never seen anyone quite as bad as Arika's dad. When climbing a hill, the only way I can keep my mind off my own strange appearance is to remind myself that I could never look like the lunatic Bill does.

I don't like ramps, either. In fact, I detest them. I'd rather stay in one spot for a week than take a ramp to get out of it. I never use the ramps at school, except the one you have to use because the floor is tilted and there are no stairs. I hate that too. You'd think they could have built a level floor instead of making us all trudge up and down some stupid ramp. I feel like I'm climbing Mount Everest! And it's not just me, everyone looks dumb walking on that thing.

This all probably sounds very strange. I guess it's just one of my annoying little pet peeves. There's nothing I can do about it. I'll always have to use stairs and walk up hills, but at least now when you see me doing one of these things and recognize how awkward I look, you'll know why. One more thing: I'm a HUGE fan of elevators. c